


heaven is overrated

by piperpied



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-05
Updated: 2019-04-05
Packaged: 2020-01-05 04:45:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18358892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piperpied/pseuds/piperpied
Summary: Jisung doesn’t see Minho the entire summer and when he comes back he’s changed. Oh, and Jisung doesn’t quite know what to do with his honey skin and the weird feeling in his own stomach whenever he smiles.Or: Jisung and Minho have known each other since second grade, and somewhere along the way realised they sort of couldn’t live apart.





	heaven is overrated

It takes three minutes from Han Jisung first meeting the brown eyed boy. 

A ball of seven year old pride and dangerous impulse, he thinks- no, he knows- in retrospect it’s far better for everyone involved that he doesn’t do it. Punch him in the face, that is.   
(And he’s never felt so strongly the desire to do so in his short life. Especially never in just three minutes). 

It’s not only because he’s always been better at throwing words than fists, even as a kid, but because it would’ve caused more harm to his own soft knuckles than Lee Minho’s nine year old face. (An irritatingly nice face; dappled with innocence and cherubian light). 

And it isn’t a matter of jealousy.   
A pout ties his lips down as he tries to explain this to another boy- Sungjae, not even his friend but just another second grader playing soccer in the tufty dirt- lawn of their local primary school’s playground, the building old and in need of a coat of paint or three.   
“How can he be the most handsome boy in the class if it was me just yesterday?” Jisung isn’t whining- he isn’t a baby.   
It’s just common sense really, that he- Han Jisung- is the the most handsome boy in their class. His mother even said so. (Really).

His gaze is critical under scrunched eyebrows, and he even has to look up at the other boy, which really isn’t helping his case. It’s not his fault his parents insisted on sending him to school a year early because he was “too bright.”

“Well, Yena says so,” Sungjae shrugs, thicker and sweatier than him, gaze one part bored and the other irritated. “And….” he trails off, deep in seven year old thought. “he’s kinda cooler than you.” 

Jisung swears he feels something wither up and die within him. The problem is, a tinny voice in the back of his seven year old brain tells him, that what Sungjae is saying is somewhat true . But it’s a voice he’ll push down persistently, unforgivingly, in order to hold his ground. Maybe. 

“Boo!” Someone shouts next to his ear all of a sudden.

Jisung fails to bite down his scream. His hands fly up defensively as he whips his head around to the guilty party. 

“Oh…..You.”   
Lee Minho, half a head taller than him, smirks at the smaller boy.   
Jisung may as well just self destruct, he thinks. He may as well tell his parents to unenroll him from this school, make up an excuse about the food being bug-infested, or that they forced everyone to play soccer during break, which he’d never been good at. 

“Didn’t meant to scare ya,” Minho teases, though the mirth on his lips implies the total opposite.   
Jisung’s deepening scowl only seems to make the other boy giggle, more.   
“You’re not handsome,” is all Jisung can manage out. His cheeks flush with embarrassment as soon as he says it, the kids nearby on the playground- including Sungjae- perking their heads in their direction curiously. Right, because just everyone was interested in the new kid who’d just transferred to their class from some high-flying city place, Jisung fumes.

Minho is frowning now, twisting those doe-ish features and crossing his arms. “Not true!” He objects, stepping away from Jisung.  
“Is so!” Jisung challenges, stepping towards him and planting his hands on his hips. Han Jisung, not one to back down from a verbal fight in his life. He didn’t need the height and muscle of other boys, he thinks defiantly.   
“Shut up!” Minho says, and maybe Jisung is seeing things but his eyes look a little wet. Then the other boy scampers off, leaving the younger flustered, and even worse, stranded on the playground. 

That’s the first time Han Jisung meets Lee Minho. And, well? Maybe he does kinda wish he’d punched him in the face for feeling this bad about wanting to.

***

 

The bus groans, slushing through gutters of stale rain water. The junior boy can only regret waking up too late to eat breakfast as his stomach whimpers.   
Last night was the first real drenching Seoul’s seen since the prickling August. Studying the fine droplets still tapping the windows, Han Jisung can only ponder how the sky, too, must be mourning the end of summer. Days of long gold heat, soaked up and still simmering under his skin. Summer like sugar and sea salt melting on his tongue; of laughing until his guts rearranged themselves, until he wanted to throw up, with Felix and Hyunjin and Changbin and Woojin and Chan- 

Jisung misses Minho.   
(The bus whines to another stop, doors sliding open to accept a few students cowering under umbrellas.)

They’d texted the whole time, but reception wasn’t fantastic in Malta - or whatever remote island in the Mediterranean Minho’s family had picked this time. Not that he’d ever, in the history of their friendship, had gone away for the whole summer. (Really, ever). In fact, the two had spent pretty much every summer together since the younger boy could remember. 

No, but it was rather the Swiss Alps, or Venice, or Tokyo, where the Lee’s vacationed in the cooler seasons. Summer was more or less reserved for, well. Friends. Jisung. He’d been almost cut when Minho had delivered, doomsday-esque, the announcement “I won’t be here for the entire 3 months of summer (summer that we’ve spent together since second grade) because my parents are rich assholes.” They weren’t actually assholes- his parents- at least, Jisung reminded himself. It also wasn’t Minho’s fault, and he probably shouldn’t have cursed as much that day, pacing up and down the elder’s bedroom as Minho watched him freak out from a cross legged position on the floor, nibbling a pepero stick.

But the thing about Jisung and Minho is that they’re solid. That’s the bottom line, the insurance mantra whenever they get into a tiff or their plans are disrupted. Like the time Jisung left their camping trip food supplies at home the summer before freshman year and they had to live off baked beans and plastic- vacuum preserved meat and soju for three days. Jisung isn’t sure when it came about; neither of them had ever said it aloud.  
But maybe the whole point was that they didn’t have to. And, well, yeah; their disagreements were trivial to say the least. (For example, Jisung isn’t about to start World War the Third over minho spilling chocolate milk on his handwritten lyrics. And cackling about it right after. Oh my god, the nerve of that boy.)

Restless, he whips out his phone and opens iMessage.

to: lee minho

ji: see you before class?? usual spot??

It’s no surprise that the three little dots don’t appear instantly, but for some reason Jisung feels a pang of impatience. Everything is setting him on edge today. He drums his fingers on one thigh just before the bus lurches around a corner, sending him crashing into the smaller boy next to him. Still distracted, he mumbles an apology that probably sounds quite nonchalant in retrospect while the boy- likely a freshman- stares at his lap, mortified. That’s what watching too many American high school dramas did to you, Jisung muses. 

1 new message  
greasy beach babe: mhm ok ~ running late tho  
ji: noooooo >:(  
ji: i mean…. sure hyung  
greasy beach babe is typing… 

The bus has pulled up, and Jisung belatedly realises that he should really be clambering to his feet to unboard it but he’s itching to see what the other boy has to say first. 

greasy beach babe: he can wait 3 months but not a couple minutes for me? Typical   
greasy beach babe changed his name to beach god   
beach god: also, i’ll have you know i look about 50 miles out of ‘greasy’ thank you very much when tf did you change that

The younger boy rolls his eyes, unable to repress a little smile even as he does so. So maybe after his ‘moment of silence for our childhood glory days’ phase he’d moved right on to taking every chance to tease Minho about him morphing into one of those dream- boat European boys; the one straight out of, like, Mamma Mia the movie, who sung ABBA songs on acoustic guitar and were always finding excuses to take off their shirts and show off their washboard abs. It was a pretty amusing picture, neither of them could deny. (Okay, maybe Jisung was exaggerating the ‘neither of them’ part).

Tucking his phone into his pant pocket, Jisung climbs to his feet. The kid who he’d been seated next to and, at one point, practically on top of is a few paces in front of him, a line taking form as the bus painstakingly unloads. Jisung shuffles to the end of it with his school bag.

Traipsing through the school gates, he’s backhanded with a rush of familiarity. The dark brick building seems to absorb some of the glary sun, spreading flat shadows across the lawn buzzing with students like some gothic imitation. 

Now, he thinks, head turning, only to find one Lee Minho… 

Suddenly, something smacks into the back of his skull.   
He yelps- louder than he’ll admit- spinning around to, well, he doesn’t quite know what yet. If it’s a stranger he’ll glare with the power of every detention teacher he’s ever had. If it’s any of his friends, they better be halfway across the Han River by now. (Cos Jisung is scary with a capital S- he knows that for a fact). 

He catches a flash of strawberry blonde hair, the scuffed toe of green converse, sniggers peppering the air before they’re drowned out.

“Yah!” Jisung protests at the backs of the blonde and raven haired boys who are distinctly recognisable, even with the amount they’ve shot up and broadened out this summer. 

“Being taller doesn’t give you abuse rights Hwang Hyunjin!” he hollers across the school lawn. The nearby students- a cluster of girls and a couple holding hands- barely turn to look in his direction, so used to the mayhem of Yongdok High they are, even after three months away from it. 

Motherfuckers. 

The subjects of Jisung’s death glare glance back at him, smirks on their lips more smug than Woojin winning mafia twice in a row. 

“Does if you can’t stop us!” Felix jeers back, juggling the soccer ball- whose imprint Jisung still currently feels on the back of his head- from knee to toe back up to knee. He bumps it over to Hyunjin, who catches and balances it on the side of one Fila sneaker effortlessly. 

Motherfuckers, but more coordinated that ten of me put together,   
Jisung thinks scornfully.  
They were the core of the soccer team, the five of them; Felix, Hyunjin, Seungmin, Chan and Minho. Meanwhile, Changbin prized his body like a trophy, and Woojin…. Just always looked good. Jisung would be lying if he said he was over the stage of being a little insecure about how he looked around them- sometimes- but it’d used to be okay when Felix and Seungmin were still gangly short sprouts.

“That’s hyung to you!” he tries to scream back, but his vocal chords give up about half way and it comes out as a half-way croak. Probably a result of rapping into his phone microphone until 3am last night. Jisung deflates. It’s his first day and literally no one wants to just give him a fucking break. The sophomore briefly forgets where he was even headed to, panicking that the ball to the head might’ve actually caused him amnesia. 

His phone buzzes.   
1 new message  
beach god: gosh ji can you walk any slower

He gasps; right, meeting up with Minho. Orienting himself with the quad proves more difficult than it should, on the far end of which is the old cottage where they kept the old sports equipment that the two of them had discovered in freshman year and promptly made their own. He takes a step that way.

“Jisungie!” Of course, fate would have it he’s not getting away so easily.  
The small boy almost karate chops the person patting his back. (Patting? More like slapping, hard.) He whips around to the familiar voice, protest ready on his lips. 

Of course, with Chan he knows it really is a matter of him not being aware how fucking strong he is.   
But it’s not just any Chris standing behind him. Catching a strip of sunlight, it’s soccer team captain and SRC member Chris he sees; “turn around its Bang Chan” Chris, totally at ease in the high school environment. A few paces behind is Seo Changbin, black muscle tee exhibiting the toned arms he’d painstakingly worked on that summer (Jisung would know, could log their entire evolution with pictures if you wanted him to). 

“Kids tormenting ya already?” Chan cocks his head, lips amused. A little of his Australian accent seeps into the Korean; the lilt always came out when he was relaxed. Jisung wishes he could relate.  
“Yeah, he replies, “don’t need my hyungs doing it too,” unintentionally sulking as he does- and holy shit, did he still pout on instinct too? He could’ve sworn he left that in the second grade.   
“Aw,” Changbin coos, in the complete opposite tone one would, should, normally say it.  
Chan pats Jisung’s arm in that world- leader here to bridge divisions sort of way.   
“Hey, no need to pout baby boy,” he sings. “Plus, have you seen Minho?”

No, because you fuckers keep interrupting me, he means to scream. (Also: baby boy).   
“Not yet,” Jisung replies indignantly.  
He pauses, something about Chan’s wording striking him as off. “Whadd’you mean ‘seen Minho’?”   
Chan’s eyes widen slightly. “He... “ he trails off, pausing a little too dramatically for Jisung’s patience. Changbin seems to notice, slipping in.   
“What Christopher means to say,” he explains, stepping forward, “is that he’s feeling confused,” he utters. “Sexually.” Changbin looks all too pleased with himself as Chan nudges him, the tips of his ears visibly pinkening. 

Oh? Is all Jisung’s mind can produce.  
The captain looks like he’s about to say something but Changbin continues, clearly enjoying himself too much.   
“Maybe you’d stop pouting if you saw him,” he adds, directed at Jisung with a glint of mirth in his eye. “Haven’t stopped it since he left.”  
The younger boy immediately scowls, pout canned.   
Jisung rolls his eyes.   
“Nice talk,” he deadpans, “ I’ve gotta get going. Hopefully see you guys not-around,” he adds, nodding rather than waving goodbye at them.

“See you at lunch, Sungie!” Chan calls for the two of them, having found his voice again, as Changbin is suddenly distracted by his phone.

All the talking has made him ridiculously late to meet Minho, and Jisung belatedly realises- as he weaves in and out of clusters of students- that at this rate reaching the cottage and trekking back in time for homeroom would be a feat of astrophysics. (And he’s always sucked ass at science class). 

For anyone else? No way in hell would he bother. But it’s Lee Minho, and he’s always made dumb exceptions for that kid. (Yes, kid, because even if Minho was the hyung Jisung felt older half the time. The other half, he was perfectly content using his youngest privileges). 

Unfortunately, at that moment the warning bell sounds, the xylophone tone chafing his ear drums, triggering him spiritual level. He frowns; maybe starting the school year off with a late slip wasn’t the best idea. His list of lates, absences and detentions at the end of last year on his report card had already been… impressive, to say the least. His parents had a real field day letting out all their repressed disapproval, he’s sure. 

He unsheathes his phone from his pocket. 

ji: sorry :[[  
ji: the unveiling of your beach godsona is gonna have to wait   
ji: got held up by Idiots !  
[beach god is typing…]  
beach god: oh  
beach god: alright nws.  
beach god: lmk if you need help, uh…. disposing of the idiots  
[ji is typing]  
ji: im not a fuckn damsel in distress min

As soon as he lands eyes on Hyunjin in homeroom he pulls him by the ear into the corner of the room, mock- kneeing and wrestling the kid with a “that’s for this morning, little shit.” The other boy whines purposely loud, and their teacher shoots Jisung a warning look. (Great, he thinks. It’s starting again, and he hasn’t even been here an hour.) 

Period one drags on like the dirty laces of his Vans on some lonely suburban pavement. Jisung is scrutinising the clock above the whiteboard by the end, willing it’s hand to inch forward and free him from history’s dust-banked cesspool. He can’t fathom how he actually used to like the subject. Though he shouldn’t be surprised; there’s a lot of things about school that used to excite him, which now hum dully through his brain cells on autopilot mode. 

But not everything. 

His fingers itch, giving into temptation as they flutter to the smartphone balanced precariously behind his pencil case. 

[damsel in jistress is typing]  
damsel in jistress: h- hyung this name   
damsel in jistress: f u >:(

The three dots pop up almost immediately, to his surprise. 

beach god: i’d fuck me too, if that were possible

Jisung snorts, bringing a hand up to his mouth to muffle the sound too late. Thankfully his teacher is absorbed in their powerpoint presentation.

damsel in jistress: stop getting hard off yourself weirdo  
damsel in jistress: anyway, see you at lunch ^.^

The bell sounds and Jisung feels every atom of his body sigh. It’s wonderful, opposite to that triggered by the bell this morning. Of course, their teacher has other ideas and starts doling out the homework in big whiteboard marker letters. Fuck that, Jisung thinks, not-so-subtly packing his things away. 

There’s a flicker of movement by the classroom door. He cocks his head up to glance over there. 

Jisung almost doesn’t recognise him- the boy leaning against the open frame.   
Screw that, he really doesn’t recognise him, until said boy cracks a smile the second their eyes meet. 

Lee Minho- the one and only- sends him a tiny wave from across the classroom. His skin is golden alright- Jisung wishes like hell he could tan like that without having it all turn red and peel- and he swears it makes his eyes look kinda starrier, his teeth brighter. It suits him well; almost a little too well, thinks Jisung. Especially when he’s wearing a white shirt that contrasts against it, body a little more filled out now, which he’s sure people have been gawking at all day (And who would blame them? He thinks. And not that he is. Gawking.)

In the midst of everything (aka Minho showing up), Jisung hasn’t noticed the classroom emptying out. Indeed, the room is almost devoid of people, or they’re milling around the doorway. He blinks rapidly. 

“You gonna stay silent and gape at me forever, Ji?” Minho pipes up, teasing smile still lighting up his features as he says it. He doesn’t need to speak loud; the chatter of students has almost been entirely transported into the hallway behind him. 

Jisung, predictably, scoffs. “Yah,” he mutters. “We haven’t spoken for months and here I was thinking it was gonna be all sentimental.” 

And if he’s still smiling as he delivers the remark, unable to contain the upward curve of his lips, the way it doesn’t convey even half his sudden, overwhelming swell of excitement, he’s not aware of it.   
Minho steps over the door frame.   
“Suppose you’re still needy.”   
“S’pose you’re still impossible,” Jisung shoots back, sticking his chin up indignantly.   
He leans casually against the side of the desk as Minho takes a few steps into the room, peeking around. 

“I definitely didn’t miss this place,” he mutters, before his eyes rest back on Jisung.   
He’s is nearly a head above him now. When did that happen? Jisung wonders with a frown. It’s unusual- for things to happen to, to change about, Minho without himself witnessing them slowly occur, and vice versa. 

Rather than responding, he decides on biting the bullet and initiates a hug between them, that the other boy reciprocates. Jisung smacks the elder on the back, chuckling.  
“Missed your annoying ass, hyung,” he grins into the cotton of Minho’s shoulder- the only hyung he can call ‘annoying ass’ in the same sentence.   
(Minho’s clothes smell of daisy fabric softener like they have since he was nine years old. This is comforting to him- to Jisung, as someone who surprisingly doesn’t like change all that much.) 

They’re still hugging. He feels the breathy laugh of the elder by his ear.   
“What,” begins the taller boy, and he knows from his tone this isn’t headed anywhere good. “Didn’t go break some beach boy’s heart this summer?” His voice is light with humour and a kind of giddy excitement that was rare for Minho, maybe. Jisung couldn’t vouch for it though, because he usually sounded like that around the younger.

He does pull away now though, shooting him a look of disgust and gagging for good measure. “Why the hell would I do that?” He exclaims.  
He glares at the elder, whose eyes now crinkle with laughter again, if only for a split second. 

“Good to know you didn’t replace me,” he teases again, more sarcasm in his tone, and pokes Jisung’s ribs through the t- shirt fabric. The smaller boy yelps, hands jumping up to bat away his fingers. “Yah!”  
“Considering how fucking big you are I might have to now,” Jisung retorts. “I’m gonna look like a freaking munchkin going ‘round with you and Chan and Hyunjin.”  
It was true. Even Felix was taller than him now. Minho shrugs, a glint in his eye as he stares back. “At least you’ve got Changbin still.” 

Then he pats Jisung on the shoulder. It’s a little awkward, or something JIsung can’t quite put his finger on, but he appreciates the gesture and shows this with a grin.   
“I missed you too, Ji,” Minho says, voice a little more sincere.   
“Mhm,” Jisung hums, liking that he can smell the fabric softener even when they’re not hugging.   
But his stomach growls as if on queue then, breaking the moment.   
“But I miss food more right now,” he adds with a quirk of his lips. 

Minho snaps out of his almost- serious kind of state, groaning, and he’s the pestering, annoyingly smug Lee Minho again. Minho who would fight for his crown as most handsome in grade two with everything he had, Minho who would manage to smear chocolate ice cream on peculiar parts of his face that neither of them could explain, which Jisung would end up rubbing off while tsk-ing, stating he’d have to get a less self-destructive flavour next time. (He never did). 

Minho murmurs a ‘C’mon slow poke, gonna stare at that wall all day?’ in Jisung’s direction before tugging him by the arm out of the classroom and cafeteria- bound. 

Jisung hadn’t even realised he’d zoned out, but he happily obliges anyway letting, himself be pulled along by the elder. It’s a kind of habit of his, trusting Lee Minho too much.

**Author's Note:**

> i guess this is chaptered?  
> (tysm for reading, minsung gay!)


End file.
